Right after closing, we headed over to the house with a hammer to see what we could unearth. Husband was quick to pull up carpet layer No. 1 on the second floor to reveal… carpet layer No. 2! And that…

We are already joking that this will be a 10-year renovation, so at least we are keeping our expectations in check. Like with any housing search there are three trade-offs for size, location and price. But our search for a new home and a renovation project during the spring of 2012 added a new variable to the mix…condition.

There was the house on 11th street in Park Slope with temporary bracing to keep the floor from caving in, the decaying house on 15th which appeared to come with the original owner, the house on 2nd with family in-fighting preventing its sale, and our personal favorite, the house on 12th which the Realtor spun as having a “gravity problem”.

We kept our search within Brooklyn and quickly realized we would need to sacrifice one of the four trade-offs. Location seemed like a good one, especially if we positioned ourselves in an up-and-coming area. As soon as we saw the house in Gowanus, our search was officially over.

The home is a legal 3-family, which gives us many different options for configuration today but also down the road should we decide to expand or contract. It sits on a 20×100 lot, has a backyard and is in surprisingly good condition for its age (credit goes to the current owners). We plan to rent out the bottom floor and convert the top two floors to a single residence.

We hope this site will document the renovation of our home, but the surrounding area as well. We expect that over the coming years both will have big changes.